Cheddar and Bacon Quiche (with spelt crust)

I don’t think I’ve mentioned it on here before…but we got chickens last spring. Their names are Rosemary, BBQ, and Scramble. My daughter named them.

We’ve had them for a year now. And they’re marvelous! Yes, apparently I have fully embraced the pseudo hippy in me and I now own backyard chickens in the middle of a town, for the sole purpose of getting eggs that I know are from pastured chickens but not paying a fortune for them. It’s not nearly as hard as I thought it would be. (Though once in a while they do escape and we have to go chasing them down the alleyway….)

And the eggs are delicious. With dark orange yolks and firm whites, the way eggs are supposed to be! And this quiche is one spectacular way to use them up. Bacon, cheese, onions, in a tender flaky crust? Yes, please!!

The quiche itself is perfectly simple. But the crust is a little trickier. It’s a lot more fragile than crusts made with white flour, so it takes some special handling. For that reason, this will be a long post because I’m going to walk you through the crust carefully so that you know exactly what to expect. Don’t be scared away by the length of the post, though! Once you get the hang of the crust it’s really not hard!

This crust is tender, flaky, and flavorful and goes really well with savory dishes!

Get a cup of whole grain spelt and half a cup of nut flour or meal (like almond or cashew) in a bowl and add in a half teaspoon of salt.

Stir the flours together, and then cut in half a cup of cold lard, cold butter, or palm shortening (or any combination of them) with a pastry cutter.

Then sprinkle in about 6 Tbsp of ice water.

and stir until it starts to hold together.

Now, depending on your flour and which fat you use, you might have to add more water. If the dough isn’t holding together, just add more a Tbsp at a time until it does.

Turn it out and pat it down onto a well-floured surface. And I mean WELL-FLOURED. You don’t want this sticking at all, because it’s pretty fragile with the nut flour.

Sprinkle some flour onto the surface of the dough, and flip it over. The bottom should be covered with flour from the counter.

Now, start to roll it out with the rolling pin. Roll it for a little…then lift it up and sprinkle the counter with more flour. You don’t want the crust to stick to the counter AT ALL or you’ll never get it up. So every so often check that it can move easily, and if it doesn’t, add more flour to keep it loose.

Keep rolling it out, checking every so often that the crust can still be easily removed from the counter, until it’s about 1/8 inch thick.

You’ll know it’s large enough by placing the pie plate top and checking!

Now, take your rolling pin and start to roll the crust off the counter and onto the pin. If you used enough flour, this shouldn’t be a problem.

Keep rolling it up until it’s all on the pin.

Slide your pie plate in front of the rolling pin.

Then pick up the rolling pin and start to unroll the crust into the pie plate.

Gently ease the crust from the edges until it’s sitting flat in the plate.

And if there’s a crack or gap in the crust…no worries! just use your fingers to pinch together cracks, and if there’s a gap you can tear off a piece of the excess and patch it in.

Take a sharp knife and cut off the excess.

My mother always used a fork to press in “designs” around the edge…so of course I do too! I’ve also used a spoon to press in half-moons around the edge too, and that’s really pretty.

So. That’s the spelt crust, and you can do this for any savory dish. If you’re doing it for something sweet, decrease the salt and add in some stevia or a bit of honey.

But we’re doing a quiche! So line the crust with two layers of tin foil.

And bake at 450 for 8 minutes. Then remove the foil and bake for another 5 minutes, or until it’s golden brown and firm. The nice thing about this crust is that it doesn’t tend to pull back and bubble up as much as my white flour crusts used to, so that’s good!

Okay. Now on to the quiche filling. While your crust is baking in the oven, start to fry up some bacon.

Processed meats can cause inflammation, so you have to choose an unprocessed, nitrate free, uncured, sugar-free bacon. In other words…an expensive bacon! I love Niman Ranch – it’s from healthy, humanely treated animals and is delicious. It’s worth it, believe me. (However, if you’d rather, you can just leave out the bacon altogether and just have a plain cheese quiche.)

Once the bacon is done, remove it and leave the drippings. Add in some chopped onions with the bacon drippings and fry them up until they’re tender and translucent.

Beat three eggs in a large bowl, and then stir in 1 1/2 cup whole milk. Then add the cooked onion, crumbled bacon, cheese, salt, nutmeg, and pepper. It’s important to add the milk BEFORE the hot onions and bacon because otherwise the heat might scramble the eggs!

Mix it all up, then pour into the hot pie crust.

Bake at 325 for 35 to 40 minutes, or until the center seems set.

Pretty!

Let it sit for about 10 minutes to firm up a bit, then slice it up.

As the weather is warming up, and you are craving lighter-but-still-delicious meals, this quiche definitely should be at the top of your list! Served with salad and fruit it’s the perfect warm weather meal!

The crust for this quiche is more fragile than a standard crust, and will require a lot of flour while rolling it out so that it doesn't stick or it will fall apart. If you forgot and it stuck to the counter, no worries! Just scrape it up and roll it out again and it'll be fine.

Ingredients

CRUST:

1 cup whole grain spelt

½ cup almond flour or meal

½ tsp salt

¼ cup cold lard or palm shortening

¼ cup cold butter (can use all butter if you can't find lard or palm shortening, but the texture will be a bit different.)

6 Tbsp ice water

FILLING:

6 slices of bacon

1 medium onion, diced

3 beaten eggs

1½ cup whole milk

½ tsp salt

¼ tsp pepper

dash of nutmeg

1½ cups shredded cheddar or colby jack cheese

1 tsp arrowroot powder

Instructions

Preheat oven to 425.

Combine the flours and salt, and cut in the butter and shortening or lard with a pastry cutter until combined.

Sprinkle in 6 Tbsp of ICE water. (it's very important that the water be cold!) Stir just until the dough comes together, adding more water if necessary (but not too much water so that it's soggy.)

Generously flour a counter or other surface, and pat the dough down on the flour. Sprinkle the top of the dough with flour and then turn it over. Pat it down a little more. Lift it up and add more flour underneath to make sure it doesn't stick.

Start to roll it out with a rolling pin, checking every so often to make sure that it's not sticking to the counter. Add more flour underneath as necessary to keep it loose.

When it's big enough to fit in the pie plate, roll the crust onto the rolling pin, then gently roll it back out into the pie plate. Ease the crust in until it's flat in the plate, using your fingers to pinch together any cracks or gaps in the dough.

Line with a double thickness of tin foil and bake for 8 minutes. Remove the tin foil and bake for another 4-5 minutes, or until it's set and dry.

Reduce oven temperature to 325.

While the crust is in the oven, fry up the bacon in a large skillet until crisp. Remove, and reserve 2 Tbsp of the bacon drippings in the pan. Add the onion and fry until it's soft and translucent.

Shred the cheese. Add the arrowroot powder and mix it together with the cheese.

In a large mixing bowl, beat together the eggs and milk. Add in the onions and the crumbled bacon. Stir in the shredded cheese, salt, pepper, and nutmeg.

Pour the egg mixture into the hot crust and bake at 325 for 35-40 minutes or until the center seems set.